This new series is unusual in that it is dedicated to the contents of a single box set of music. “The Anthology of American Folk Music” may not be one of the most popular albums of all time, but it certainly is one of the most important albums ever made, if not the single most important album, period.

The series was released just as the twelve-inch 33 RPM record format was popularized, making it even more unusual for its time. Before 1952, music was disseminated mostly as 10” 78 RPM discs, so the novelty of an album containing multiple songs on each side of the disk was something of a novelty, and this box set was particularly special, as it contained a collection of recordings by an agglomeration of near-or-totally forgotten folk artists.

At first, sales were abysmal, but the folk movement of the late ‘50s/early ‘60s generated an interest from a new generation that had genuine interest in America’s musical origins.

Herein lies the roots of America’s musical culture, a collection of obscure songs performed by regional (mostly rural) artists that, from today’s perspective, almost seem to be haunted. Most of the recordings were already thirty years old or more when “Anthology of Folk Music” was released, which is to say that they had been as forgotten as old newspaper and lost in the mists of time.

As I write this, most of those songs are just about one-hundred years old now, which only adds to the luster of importance that this collection represents. Were it not for the fortuitous insight of Harry Smith, the iconoclast responsible for compiling these recordings for re-release in a quasi-illegal manner (nobody seemed concerned about who may have owned the rights to these obscure recordings), it is possible, if not likely that America would have lost a gigantic chunk of its musical roots. In that sense alone, “The Anthology of American Folk Music, is nothing less than a miracle. Here is how it begins.

Feature Tracks:

Henry Lee - Dick Justice

Fatal Flower Garden - Nelstone's Hawaiians

The House Carpenter - Clarence Ashley

Drunkard's Special    Coley Jones

Old Lady and The Devil - Bill & Belle Reed

The Butcher's Boy - Buell Kazee

The Waggoner's Lad - Buell Kazee

King Kong Kitchie Ki-Mi-O  - Chubby Parker

Old Shoes and Leggins - Uncle Eck Dunford

Willie Moore - Dick Burnett and Leonard Rutherford